Despite the promise of data-driven technologies, digital progress is hindered by identity theft, data leaks, AI privacy risks, and reluctance surrounding cross-border data sharing.
The EU-funded TrustED project is developing an interoperable, privacy-by-design framework that enables secure collaboration without sacrificing data ownership. Built around the EU Digital Identity Wallet, the platform replaces risky centralised databases with local data spaces and Privacy-Enhancing Technologies, including zero-knowledge proofs, homomorphic encryption, and differential privacy, to verify information and compute insights while keeping raw data protected. Additionally, its federated learning model analyses data directly on source devices, allowing organisations to train algorithms without information ever leaving its original location.
The TrustED team recently completed initial testing across two real-world environments. The first pilot evaluated a self-sovereign identity wallet for volunteers and non-governmental organisations to manage and present credentials, with upcoming work focused on adding web interfaces and a unified opportunity dashboard.
The second pilot tested federated learning across hospital networks to streamline clinical research workflows, evaluate governance, and build stakeholder trust, with next steps involving access portals and organisational wallets to authenticate institutions.
As Jaime Loureiro Acuña, Head of Advanced Data Security at project coordinator Gradiant, explained, the ultimate goal is to help users and organisations maximise data value while ensuring absolute privacy.
